Favourites
by AlwaysPadfoot
Summary: Remus notices Hermione crying and offers help.


**AN:** Comps and Prompts down the bottom.

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 **Favourites**

 **AlwaysPadfoot**

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This first time Remus caught her crying she immediately wipes her eyes and pretends that she is okay.

Hermione Granger is one of his most promising and intelligent students. It is a joy to mark her essays. Honestly, she makes Remus' life a whole lot easier — it's great to have homework that isn't a chore to mark. So when he sees her all red-faced and puffy-eyed on the seventh-floor corridor, he has to reach out.

"Miss Granger, are you okay?"

She looks like she's been caught hiding a body the way she reacts. She sniffs and rubs her eyes quickly, forcing herself to perk up as she turns and looks up into his amber eyes.

"Oh! Yes, I'm fine."

He opens his mouth to respond, to say something along the lines of 'Are you sure Hermione?', but she's already hurrying away. Remus is left standing in the corridor alone, watching her leave. He hopes that this is a one-off thing; he can't stand the idea that one of his students is hurting and he hasn't helped.

He crosses his fingers that he won't see Hermione crying again.

* * *

Unfortunately, it's too good to be true.

The next time he finds Hermione crying, she's sat on the embankment adjacent to the Whomping Willow. It's just on the precipice of the Forbidden Forest. She doesn't hear him approaching because as he drops into the grass beside her, she startles.

Remus does his best to give her a soft look; he's not there to interrogate her.

"I'm fine, really," Hermione says, her voice hoarse.

"You don't seem fine, Hermione," Remus tells her.

Clearly, she's been waiting for someone to vent to, because she pours her heart out to him. She's feeling guilty about punching Draco Malfoy, a Slytherin in the same year.

"Did you really do that?" he asks.

She nods. Whilst Remus feels her actions are understandable, there's something about the way she feels that doesn't make sense. Why she is feeling so guilty isn't clear at all.

And then it is.

"...it just makes me feel like my d—" Hermione cuts herself off and sighs, wiping her eyes. "I'm sorry, Professor, you must think I'm an awful person."

"I don't think that at all," he says.

She doesn't say anything in response. Remus gives her the best advice he can come up with, telling her if she feels so guilty she should apologise. Because he's a professor, he also tells her she shouldn't ever resort to physical violence, but he decides against punishing her for breaking school rules. She's punishing herself enough.

Later that evening, Remus casually drops Hermione Granger into conversation with Professor McGonagall. They talk over tea twice a week and Minerva explains, as she fills up their cups from a flowery pink teapot, that she delivered Hermione's Hogwarts letter before first year. When Remus asks how her parents reacted, there's a flash of something in the Professor's eyes when she replies.

' _Her father seemed most unimpressed.'_

* * *

Hermione comes to Remus one evening just after the full moon as he's marking sixth-year essays in the Defence classroom. He's on his second cup of coffee. His sixth years have written far more than he expected. Even though he knows this means they're enjoying his classes, it leaves him with a lot of homework to get through tomorrow. The full moon does nothing for allowing him to keep up with his marking.

"Hi, Professor, are you feeling better?" Hermione asks.

"Much better, thank you, Hermione," he responds. "How can I help you?"

"I was wondering whether I could talk to you about something?"

Remus places his quill in the holder on his desk and gestures for Hermione to take a seat. Pushing his stack of essays to the side, Remus wants to make sure he can give her his full attention. As Hermione takes a seat and perches on the edge of it, she bites her lip. She can't quite meet his eye when she looks at him and so he clears his throat.

"What do you want to talk about?"

"Do many Muggleborns decide that the magical world isn't for them?" she blurts out.

Remus admits he's taken back by the question. He has never known a Muggleborn to not like the magical world; in his experience, they tend to love the magical world a whole lot more than those who were brought up in it.

"What makes you ask that?" Remus asks.

"Nothing in particular." Hermione looks away again when she answers, picking at the scorch mark on the table — a telltale sign she isn't being truthful with him. "I was just wondering whether it's common or not."

"In my experience, no," Remus says. "Hermione, are you not enjoying being at Hogwarts?"

Her eyes go wide at the question; she looks horrified. "No, no, I love being at Hogwarts. I love everything about this world."

"Then what's wrong?"

"My dad," she sighed. "He always wanted me to be a dentist like him and my mum. So that I can work in their practice when I'm older."

"Dentist..." Remus repeats. "These are Muggle Healers for teeth, correct?"

Hermione nods.

"Do you want to be a dentist?" he asks and she's shaking her head before he can finish his sentence. "Then you need to accept that you are a talented young witch, Hermione. One day you will do great things in the magical world. If you start telling yourself that every time you think about your father wanting you to be a dentist, then you'll start to accept that."

Hermione looks unconvinced. "But my dad…"

"To an extent it doesn't matter, most parents push unrealistic expectations onto their children," Remus explains. "Things will change, I'm sure, Hermione — you're on your way to doing brilliantly in your end of year examinations. Speaking of…"

He stands up and goes across to the piles of essays he has already marked. He leafs through and finds Hermione's near-perfect Outstanding and brings it back. "If you want to learn more about Grindylows I'd suggest you read Hilda Grenfold's _The Grapple with the Grindylow._ But other than that Hermione, this was a perfect piece of work."

Hermione blushes.

"Thank you, Professor," she replies as he hands it to her.

"Your essays are truly a blessing to mark," Remus admits with a smile. "Just don't tell anyone I said that; I'm not supposed to have favourites."

She's smiling when she leaves his office a little later. Remus likes to think he's helped.

* * *

On the evening Remus returns to his office, a few days after his roam through the forest, he finds a letter on his desk. He recognises the handwriting on the front. Cursive purple letters spell out his title — Professor Lupin.

It's from Hermione Granger.

He slips his finger under the flap of the envelope and opens it carefully. Removing the letter from its envelope, he unfolds it and reads.

 _Dear Professor Lupin,_

 _First of all, I'm sorry for my accusations in the Shrieking Shack; it was very wrong of me to jump to such conclusions when you have done so much for me this year._

 _I'm also sorry that you now have to leave Hogwarts. You have been our best Defence Professor and it's unfair that you have to give up your position because of your lycanthropy. I hope that you can find something that you love doing after you leave Hogwarts._

 _I wanted the chance to thank you for talking to me and offering advice this year when I was struggling. I am a lot more confident going home for the summer now and I believe in myself a lot more. My destiny is the magical world and I hope my dad will understand that someday soon. And even if he doesn't, you made me believe in myself and my magic._

 _I wish you the best of luck._

 _Thank you for this year,_

 _Hermione Granger._

Remus puts the letter down as he sits at his desk, overwhelmed by Hermione's letter. Despite the fact that he has chosen to leave the school, rather than being fired, he is still upset. He has enjoyed teaching at Hogwarts more than any of his other jobs.

He _had_ told himself he would travel during the summer holidays, but now he has a big kid to look after. He has Sirius to track down and make sure that he isn't doing anything stupid. Remus laughs to himself — Sirius is always doing something stupid. He's been the same since he was eleven years old. Hermione is right to wish him luck.

He's going to need it.

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 **Comps and Prompts**

 **Ami's Amazingly Average Apartment:** Hermione/Remus - Object: Teapot

 **IHC** : 178. Location - DADA Classroom

 **365** : 203. Plant/Flower - Whomping Willow

 **Gobstones** : Bronze Stone - Courage [A: 18. (setting) Forbidden Forest , P: 3. (dialogue) "Did you really do that?", T: 19. (food) coffee]

 **WC - Disney** \- T2. Acceptance of Self - Write about someone accepting who they are as a person.

 **WC - Showtime** \- 9. Everybody Say Yeah - (word) Destiny

 **WC - Ambers Attic** \- 7. Bass Ackwards: Write about someone pretending to be tougher than they actually are.

 **WC - Ami's Audio Admirations** \- 10. Know it All — Write about Hermione Granger.

 **SC - Days of the Year** \- **July 20 2018 - Moon Day:** Write about Remus Lupin.

 **SC - Summer Prompts -** (word) travel

 **SC - Colours** \- Amber

 **SC - Fire Element** \- (word) scorch

 **SC - Gryffindor Prompts** \- Easy: Hermione Granger

 **Dragon Breeding & Fanfiction Writing Month**

 **Word Count** : 1439


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